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Mobile Flash Fail: Weak Android Player Proves Jobs Right

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Re: Mobile Flash Fail: Weak Android Player Proves Jobs Right

#121

Post by kreek »

gaiusparx wrote: post #43

Just curious, if you are Flash app developer, are you considering moving to HTML5? Is HTML5 and JavaScript mature enough for the job? Is there a tool/utility that helps convert/migrate Flash codes to HTML5/JavaScript?

I'm a Flex/Flash dev and I've looked at HTML5 a couple of times recently. The main product I work on is a web app similar to Adobe Illustrator for customizing print products. You can draw vector shapes etc fine with HTML5 (or SVG) but fonts is another matter because of legal issues. Yes there are some open source fonts now but they are not of the same quality plus we'd have to go back and change all our old designs to use the new fonts.

The big issue for me is development time. ActionScript is compiled, our app has close to 50 classes and uses dependency injection. Right now I can't imagine doing it with JS.

If you're looking for a tool to convert Flash to HTML 5 http://smokescreen.us/ looks promising.

Re: Mobile Flash Fail: Weak Android Player Proves Jobs Right

#122

Post by bastardlee »

CodeMage wrote: post #32
warfangle wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"even 'fast' JS VMs are still rather slow" Compared to C, Java, OCaml, and so forth, perhaps. Compared to Ruby, Python, and PHP - not so much. (take a look at the v8 entry. and this is from '09 - v8 has seen some performance improvements since then) http://blog.gmarceau.qc.ca/2009/05/speed-size-and-dependabil...

None of those comparisons really matter in this discussion, except Java, which is clearly out of the competition anyway. Why? Because unless you're suddenly running Ruby, Python, PHP, C or OCaml as a client-side script embedded in your browser, you're comparing apples to oranges. It would be interesting, though, if someone could point me (and everyone else) to a reasonable, credible comparison of HTML5+JS vs. Flash v…

this doesn't include Silverlight in the comparisons, but it compares HTML5+JS vs. Flash on Mac and Windows platforms (and a few browsers):

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/does_html5_really_beat_...

Re: Mobile Flash Fail: Weak Android Player Proves Jobs Right

#123

Post by albertzeyer »

sshumaker wrote: post #98
asolove wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're talking about Google, a company who wrote their own cleanroom Java implementation and reverse-engineered ActiveX to create a ChromeFrame implementation still compatible with anything that ever worked in IE. I think they could speed things up a bit. ActionScript is just JS plus some extra sugar. JS implementations have gotten hundreds of times faster in the last three years, while Flash has gotten slower. Slap a…

A lot of what goes on in SWF files is the art data (vector graphics, the 'movieclip' object, etc). Flash comes with a pretty extensive API for manipulating graphics and these objects, all which needs to be rewritten for mobile. There's a lot there, believe me. Unfortunately, much of that content is what causes the problem. Using the artist tools (Flash CS3), you can generate content that simply fumes memory, without…

Or to put it different: Everyone can build a crappy webpage. Flash helps in making that easier.

Re: Mobile Flash Fail: Weak Android Player Proves Jobs Right

#124

Post by elblanco »

illumin8 wrote: post #115
bruceboughton wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rubbish! Most moderately advanced HTML5 demos run hideously, if at all, on mobile hardware. The difference will be if HTML5 can replace 80% of Flash uses in a performant manner. The video tag makes up a huge block of that 80%. The other 20% will always run like a dog on mobile hardware, no matter the technology.

Have you watched the Apple HTML5 demos on an iPad? It's actually revolutionary to see what they can do with the limited hardware. Being able to touch and drag a 3d model around at 30 fps without stuttering? I can't even do that on a lot of PCs with Flash.

Here ya go. Give this a try and let us know how it runs.

http://xplsv.com/prods/demos/xplsv_orsotheysay/

Re: Mobile Flash Fail: Weak Android Player Proves Jobs Right

#125

Post by SteveC »

gaiusparx wrote: post #43

Just curious, if you are Flash app developer, are you considering moving to HTML5? Is HTML5 and JavaScript mature enough for the job? Is there a tool/utility that helps convert/migrate Flash codes to HTML5/JavaScript?

YouTube listed the reasons why they still use Flash over HTML 5

http://apiblog.youtube.com/2010/06/flash-and-html5-tag.html

Re: Mobile Flash Fail: Weak Android Player Proves Jobs Right

#126

Post by Daishiman »

diego_moita wrote: post #118
CodeMage wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of those comparisons really matter in this discussion, except Java, which is clearly out of the competition anyway. Why? Because unless you're suddenly running Ruby, Python, PHP, C or OCaml as a client-side script embedded in your browser, you're comparing apples to oranges. It would be interesting, though, if someone could point me (and everyone else) to a reasonable, credible comparison of HTML5+JS vs. Flash v…

I've been playing with Silverlight and am very well impressed. It is much faster than Flash (my tests where the RSA encryption algorithm), has a way more comprehensive library (specially for data manipulation) and "looks" way more secure than Flash (please take this last one with a grain of salt). Its acceptance is still lagging (I estimate something like 50%-60%), but growing fast. MS promised the new Windows 7 phon…

Are you insane? I've had to develop a CRUD application in Silverlight, and it was dauntingly slow in comparison to Ruby and Python frameworks, and the tooling is still behind the rest of the C# frameworks.

I made a blog post a few weeks ago on the matter: http://www.andresosinski.com.ar/blog_view_entry/?id=6

Re: Mobile Flash Fail: Weak Android Player Proves Jobs Right

#127

Post by mgcross »

I ran the "Man in Blue" tests: http://www.themaninblue.com/writing/perspective/2010/03/22/ on my N1 running Flash 10.1 in the default (webkit-based, I assume) browser and was surprised at how much faster Flash was than the HTML or canvas tests: HTML: 6.5 fps Canvas: 13.2 fps SVG: blank page? Flash: 25.3 fps

For reference, my eeePC 901 only managed 34 fps in the Flash demo (Chrome 6, Flash 10.1)

N1 running demo with 500 particles and shadows: Canvas: 2.7 fps Flash: 17.4 fps

Re: Mobile Flash Fail: Weak Android Player Proves Jobs Right

#128

Post by zacharypinter »

I can see the argument against Flash in a mobile browser. I've tried it on my N1, and have been less than impressed with how it handles zooming, panning, focus, etc.

However, that doesn't mean that porting Flash apps to mobile apps is a bad idea. Flex is still one of the best gui frameworks I've worked with, and I'd love to use it for mobile development. Just not inside the browser.

Re: Mobile Flash Fail: Weak Android Player Proves Jobs Right

#129

Post by jonknee »

orangecat wrote: post #47
zsouthboy wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your iPhone's processor may have a larger number representing its clock, but your laptop's processor is likely much faster. You can't compare different CPU architectures by the number of hz. Desktop (=laptop in this case) processors are out-of-order power-sucking beasts compared to the power sipping CPU in your phone and other devices. Watts vs. milliwatts in comparison.

Unscientific Python benchmark: t1=time.time(); x=[i*i for i in xrange(1000000)]; time.time()-t1 On my 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo iMac, this runs in 0.47 seconds. On my Nexus One (using the Python executable from Scripting Layer for Android), it takes around 3.8 seconds. So the N1 is around an eighth of the speed of the iMac (ignoring the C2D's second core), which is actually pretty impressive.

Keep in mind that the N1 has a 1 GHz CPU, so the OP was correct in that you can't do an apples to apples comparison when different architectures are at play.

Re: Mobile Flash Fail: Weak Android Player Proves Jobs Right

#130

Post by jonknee »

cmelbye wrote: post #15
contextfree wrote: post #12

Do the videos need to be optimized for mobile because of API incompatibilities, or just to make up for dearer machine resources (CPU, RAM, network etc.) available on mobile? If the latter, wouldn't it presumably be just as possible to make HTML apps that don't work on mobile for the same reasons? Ditto for the game control issue - if someone makes an game that's designed for keyboard control (or a site dependent on "…

Yes, that's the point. The author is saying that if you have to go through and convert your existing Flash content to work on a mobile device, why not go the full distance and convert it to HTML5?

"So it will still work on IE" is going to be a pretty common response for that question for the foreseeable future. Right now when you go the HTML 5 right you still need to fall back to Flash.
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